FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT AMSTERDAM - PAGE 2

Amsterdam, known for its free thoughts and great lifestyle is what makes Ederhard van der Laan, the Mayor of the city so proud. He was in India recently. During his Mumbai trip, he lead a team of delegates for the collaboration of the Dutch Cobra Museum with Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum in South Mumbai. He spoke to ET-Travel about what catches his eye in India and how the attractions of Amsterdam can be a big draw for Indian tourists. Goldmine factors History and Culture are goldmines of a city.

NEW DELHI: Loss-making Air India has shifted its offices in Washington, Los Angeles and Amsterdam to less expensive premises, saving thousands of dollars every month in rentals. The national carrier has embarked on restructuring of overseas offices as part to its overall cost-cutting measures. Faced with intense competition from private airlines and high operational cost, Air India has been grappling with huge losses for the past few years. The airline's decision to shift its Washington office from January this year has brought down its monthly rental expense by more than $2,500.

Far-out destination: Flathead Forest, Montana Indian Surprise : Lonar Crater near Aurangabad - it's almost like a sci-fi movie coming to life Bon Vivant Moment: Chinese Banquet Meal at Hangzhou with fish head and exquisite wine Outdoor Activity: Trekking while it was snowing at the Colorado mountains Emptied your pockets at: Paying for an Ola Cab, called for in a hurry at the Bangalore Airport, without realising...

AMSTERDAM: Shares in Dutch high-frequency trading firm Flow Traders rose at the start of trade on Friday after the company's initial public offering (IPO). The stock rose 6.7 per cent to 34.15 euros shortly after the start of trade on Euronext in Amsterdam , putting the company's value at about 1.5 billion euros ($1.7 billion). The company set its IPO price at 32 euros per share, toward the lower end of an indicative range of 29-37 euros per share.

NEW DELHI: KLM-Northwest on Thursday announced the launch of self-service check-in facility for its passengers flying out of Mumbai airport. The airlines said it had installed three self-service check-in machines in cooperation with the Airports Authority of India at the Mumbai international airport. KLM-Northwest currently offers 18 weekly flights from India, including a daily flight to Amsterdam from Delhi and Mumbai and four weekly flights from Hyderabad to Amsterdam.

Canals , cycles, clogs, cheese, culture, and cinemascope landscapes of tulips, elusive Red Street... top this up with a Heineken beer bash and you have the Netherlands experience for you! Beautiful sights of rivers flowing into canals above ground level are poignant reminders that two-thirds of this country is below sea level. Holland hallmarks, the windmills that once in fact, served the very critical function of generating the power needed to pump the water to the sea behind the dykes.

NEW DELHI: The government has confirmed that all the 12 passengers, detained from a Mumbai-bound flight that was escorted back to Amsterdam due to their 'suspicious behaviour', were of Indian origin. The passengers, who are being interrogated by the Dutch police, have cited Mumbai localities as their home addresses. The list of the detainees has been handed over to New Delhi. They have been identified as Sohail Abdul Aziz Nizami, Ayub Qadir, Sajid Qadir, Yusuf Haji Ghaffar Memon, Nur Mohammed Batliwala, Shakeel Usman Chotani, Ayub Khan, Ehsan Farooqi, Ghulam Mustafa, Mohammed Yusuf, Mohammed Imran and Mohammed Iqbal Batliwala.

Owners of a Dutch cargo ship have been ordered to pay $70,000 for polluting Canadian waters. Biglift Goedkoop BV of Amsterdam pleaded guilty in a Newfoundland provincial court to violating the Canada Shipping Act. In August 2003, a surveillance flight spotted an oil slick trailing the MV Project Europa, heading from Spain to Montreal. According to Transport Canada officials, approximately 40 litres of oil discharged into the Atlantic.

GUWAHATI: Indian flowers are gaining popularity among the European buyers. Well, you may call it the sunny side of WTO. Buoyed by the new popularity, Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (Apeda), the nodal agency for farm exports, is eyeing a bigger pie of the $7bn world flower market. It is adopting a festival-specific promotion strategy in Amsterdam flower auction centre, the biggest flower market in the world, to boost the demand and price realisation of Indian flowers.

Now , who would have imagined that monsoon time in India could spring such brilliant surprises. Europe is experiencing a bright and cheery summer and standing absolutely in awe of the Indian traveller (we are currently considered the most sought after tourists from across the world). ET-Travel suggests you make the most of the European Summer, now that it's packaged a whole lot attractively. Incidentally, European Summer Time is an arrangement by which clocks are advanced by one hour in Spring to make the most of seasonal daylight . This is done in all European countries except Iceland, which observes Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)